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You know about Montessori Inspired Activities For Pre-Schoolers and I know many of you downloaded the free kindle version when it launched. Well, I really could do with some more 4 and 5 star reviews. If you have got a copy of the book then please pop over to Amazon and leave me a review. Some people complained that they couldn't figure out how, so I made this infograph to help with that. So just click: HERE

Jo's great course

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1. Tell us a bit about yourself....

Around 6 years of age I hated my name, Erinn, and wondered why my parents gave me such an odd name, esp. with 2 ‘n’s in it! It took a couple of decades, but now I love it and would never have it any other way. 

I was born in southern California, and have spent over half my life abroad, most of it in Japan, most of that in Kansai. 

I do a variety of things, teach English, the odd narration job, assist my husband with translation, and about 1-1/2 years ago started up a small jewelry business. Add to that raising my children, cooking, cleaning, shopping and the myriad of activities that go into being a mother.

I hate fish, really and truly, but I love tako-yaki. I hate the end of winter cause I’m just anxious for it to end, but I love the end of spring, right before the weather turns from perfect to baking hot. I love temples and shrines, and how the Japanese religion is not so much a religion as it is a lifestyle and they are pretty relaxed about it. I hate falsetto voices, they drive me insane, but I absolutely love the Japanese transportation system!

2. Where do you get your inspiration from?
Inspiration for my jewelry comes from many sources, usually the world around me. I am a visual person, colors and patterns speak to me. Inspiration will also come from holidays or seasons, but more often than not, inspiration comes from my customers, as I try to work very close with them to create their perfect piece. I like to call my pieces wearable art.




3. Tell us about your business...
It’s a growing jewelry business, bracelets are the main focus though I make chokers and earrings, and have some plans to dabble in metal clay and make rings.
I love stones, always have felt a connection to stones, shells, wood, forests, the sea, and nature at large. Stones are each so unique and full of color and beauty, each one is a small universe in itself. I decided to base my jewelry in genuine precious or semi-precious gemstones, and incorporate leather and on occasion silver to the mix. I refuse to use plastics of any type, with the exception of the thread, and avoid glass beads as well.





4. What led you to start your business?
I saw a bracelet in a shop and fell in love with the style. It was very ‘me’. But the price was pretty much out of my budget at the time, so I came home and found a tutorial for making my own. Next week I picked up some cord and stones, thread, gave it a try, posted a picture on FB and started getting requests for it. It was scary and thrilling, deciding to go ahead and start selling pieces, but since then it’s been a wonderful journey.

5. What does an average day look like for you?
None of my days are average, unfortunately. But usually I’ll have coffee and check mail, take care of correspondence in the morning, try to spend half an hour or so with my Little Man doing his reader and English writing practice before he goes to nursery school. Then either off to work or cleaning the house, sorting out mail and requests. Later on I start working on pieces I need to create, or patterns for customers. Late afternoon I’ll pick up my little guy and make dinner. But days I am out of the house for teaching are usually focused solely on teaching.

6. What is the one thing about your job that makes your heart sing?
Hearing back from customers always makes me smile. Knowing that a piece turned out just as they wanted, that it fits, that ir arrived, that it was perfect for them, really makes it worth it. I love starting new patterns, seeing colors come together. My customers often push me to try new combinations I wouldn’t have thought would work, only to discover they were right and a beautiful piece of art emerges from the mix.

7. Share a secret with us that has never been shared online before
I tend to be attracted to a man’s voice. Think Darth Vader, Sean Connery, Anthony Hopkins, not to mention singers: Coldplay, Lifehouse, Rob Thomas, Alex Band, Foster the People. It’s the voice that gets me every time!


Erinn at Off on a Whim has carved out a small piece of the world for herself. Handcrafted customized precious and semi-precious gemstone jewelry, using genuine stones and leather, no plastics, are part of her style.

Creating a life for herself in Japan hasn’t always been easy. Navigating a foreign culture, language and alphabet, throw in children, work and a husband, she has faced the challenges before her, and while not always conquering each one, has continued moving forward each day, refusing to give in and call it quits.

She says, ‘I’m lucky to have many wonderful people in my life who keep me positive and inspire me to focus on the present and the future, help me put the past behind me and start over each day. My kids are the best thing I ever did with my life and they give me my true purpose!’


For the lovely readers of Jo’s blog:

Use JOSBLOG discount code to get 15% off any purchase at either Etsy or on FB.
Contact me via either one to discuss details of your own customized piece. Whether you want something purely for it beauty, or you want a bit more, something with specific meaning to help you in an area of your life that is challenging you right now, I love working together to find the right stones/colors to make something special just for you!

Find Erinn at:

website : OffonaWhimJewelry.etsy.com
Facebook : facebook.com/offonawhim
Blog: http://offonawhimhandcrafted.blogspot.jp/

10 Tips For Home Schoolers to Stay Organized

Make A Home For Everything: This is my mantra and I say it because it works. If everything has a specified home it is much easier to keep the place tidy and organized, (and much easier to find things when you need them).

Storage Bin and Boxes: Perfect for keeping things looking neat and tidy on the shelf. Make sure they are well labelled and you keep the contents according to the labels.

Store Subject Items Together: This might be easier said than done, depending on the size of your home but having subject zones make it easier for you to grab what you need when you need it.

Learn The Art Of Rotation: Often we have too much 'stuff' to have it all out on the shelves at one time. If that is the case, rotate your activities. Using a seasonal basket or shelf is one easy way to introduce rotation. I also recommend setting a time each week to swap your shelves around. Rotating items keeps them fresh for your child and having less on the shelves makes it look better, tidier and more organized and makes it easier for your child to decide what to study with next.

Use Colour Coding: If you have more than one child then colour code your binders, the children's notebooks etc. Alternatively use colour coding for subjects, Montessori makes good use of this and it makes it easier for bother teachers/parents and the children. Whatever your labelling system of choice is, be sure to stick with it for the year to prevent confusion.

Set A Week To Declutter: It is easy to over accumulate 'stuff' so set a week aside before the start of your school year to give your homeschool area a good de-clutter. Throw out, or pass on anything you no longer need or your children have outgrown.

Family Schedule: You can do this on paper or on the computer but try and get the whole family into the habit of keeping up with their schedule making. We use google calendar for all our scheduling, we all have our own calendar, a family one and my husband and I have our work schedules on there too. It is easy to check at a glance to see if a new event will clash with something else.

Pinterest: Use pinterest to keep project ideas and lesson plans all in one place. Set up boards for each topic or subject then anything you stumble upon as you are surfing the net can be kept all together in one place, much easier than wading through hundreds of bookmarks.

Specify Your Work Area: So often we end up having homeschool bits all over the house. Decide where is the work area and make sure that your child has all the items they need at hand in that area. Of course you can have different zone, they might have a writing statoin in one room and a study and experiement are in another room.

End Of Day Clean Up: This should be applied to everywhere really, when you and your children have finished for the day, tidy everything away so that you have a nice clean desk/room/kitchen to start on the next day. Having to clear away the previous days mess before you can et started for the day is a downer and a waste of precious time, much easier to get it done at the end of the day.

Jo Ebisujima is a Brit living in Japan, she has been raising her bilingual son in a Montessori environment and is the founder of My Organized Chaos, where she helps busy moms to organize their home and kids so that they have more time for the fun stuff.

The next My Organized Chaos e-course kicks off February 18th, the doors for early bird registration are open now. 

beryl

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